Envisioning the streamlined fabrication of customized pieces, panels, or chunks delivered just-in-time, for the quick, and easy assembly of a house or building has been the ambitious value proposition of many industrial protagonists. Some have succeeded in harmonizing their business model with a localized specific demand; however, the more generalized industrialization of construction required to increase productivity and respond to the growing challenges of onsite construction is still elusive. The required reform toward production in construction, is all-encompassing from the small onsite contractor to the large developer. The industry is too bogged down by old habits; manufacturing requires upfront investments that make it difficult to compete in terms of costs and agility with conventional builders.
A startup based in Alberta, Canada, is striving to reform the prefab producer’s business model based on a completely integrated Factory Operating System that deploys lean robotic production to streamline the framing of house panels for floors and roofs. Promise Robotics is looking at prefab in a new way by understanding how robots can be taught to assemble project specific and industry standardized framing patterns, in a just-in-time factory-to-site delivery process. A relatively small production bay is controlled by the file-to-machine data-driven process. The robotic arms can switch from lifting, cutting, placing, aligning, nailing, seamlessly executing machine learned patterns orchestrated to produce a 40-foot wall framed panel in 8 minutes.
Two robotic arms working in conjunction, borrowed from the automotive industry, were set up to learn from a local manufacturer's production process and endeavor to reproduce timber framing in idealized AI-driven conditions. From this research and development, the company is proposing to market agile «flying factories» all over the country to help increase supply and encourage the adoption of new prefab ideas. Recognizing that housing construction is not only a production problem but includes material management, supply chain harmonization, and factory to site logistics, their value proposition includes an operating system that outlines and manages every part of the process, including the choreographed robotic assembly of wall components.
 |
| See article in https://www.canadianmanufacturing.com/manufacturing/promise-robotics-opens-new-homebuilding-facility-in-alta-312995/ |
No comments:
Post a Comment